


safehouse

by mattholomuse



Series: McGenji Week 2k17 [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, McGenji Week, i hope is the tag???, some mention of past violence (again. hanzo), theres a lot of laughing in this fic & all the following mcgenji fics because i Like that, this doesnt have a particular timeline. after ovw fell but before recall, this is my first time finishing a mcgenji fic.... feels good feels organic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2017-11-26
Packaged: 2019-02-07 07:31:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12836304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mattholomuse/pseuds/mattholomuse
Summary: Jesse and Genji lay low and, half asleep, discuss the future they want to achieve.





	safehouse

**Author's Note:**

> mcgenji week day 1 - settling down

“Is this it?”

“This is it, pumpkin. It ain’t much, but, ah, neither are we.”

A laugh. “It’s more than enough for me. It’s better than the motel.”

Jesse grunted, bobbing his head agreeably. “Anything is, innit?”

Genji’s laughter rang through the air like a shot, warmer than the southern heat encasing them.

They stood before a house that was scarcely more than a shack. Once, it had been painted a deep, handsome red, trimmed with white. Now, the red was faded and peeling, and the white was a sickly yellow-grey. It looked tired. Beaten.

Genji approached the front door on silent feet, where he stood on his tippy-toes to peer into a little window. He saw a ratty couch and a TV before two big hands settled on his side, pulling him gently back.

“Y’all know you can open doors, yeah?” Jesse joked, nudging the door open - it screeched and groaned like a dying animal, but it did not physically protest.

They entered the tiniest safehouse Genji had ever seen. There was a living room comprised of a TV and a tattered orange couch sat upon a patchy rug; the kitchen, an old-fashioned oven and a kiddie-sized sink; and a niche with a little bed in it. Genji saw no bathroom.

“Outhouse,” Jesse said, carefully eyeing Genji. When Genji bounced in surprise, he looked away. “Like I said, it ain’t much, but we’ll make do.”

“Always,” Genji responded. The safehouse was a pigeonhole, tiny to the point of claustrophobia. Close quarters did not mix well with Genji’s need for movement.

Jesse didn’t appear to have any qualms with it, as he dropped himself like a great cat onto the couch. One of his leather-clad legs dangled over the arm and his spurs jingled into silence. The fall had knocked his hat askew; it lay now on his face, crooked enough to leave one dark eye uncovered.

He sighed once before turning his microphone to the chirp of crickets.

They were a distant music, muffled by the wooden walls and the molasses-thick grass lacing this nest of earth. No matter where Genji looked outside, he was always greeted by the sight of wild green. Occasionally the grass stirred, and the crickets chirped louder, only to return to their hum when the wind passed.

Genji explored the kitchen. He made note of the coffee machine, then wondered if this place even had the ingredients for coffee. A quick flip through the cabinets provided the answer: absolutely not. What it did have was a few cans of beans and peaches, an unopened box of instant rice, and a snack cake dated twelve years ago.

“Are zebra cakes meant to be hard as rocks?” Genji called. Jesse’s laughter tumbled through the doorway.

“Only if you get ‘em riled up, darlin’,” came the response. Jesse’s laughter paused, he called “sorry”, and then it resumed. Genji grinned.

“That was a bad joke, Jess.” He strolled back into the living room. Jesse lay flat on his back, cozy as a kitten. A content smile rested on his mouth. 

After he had left Blackwatch, Genji thought he had lost that smile for good. He had not known if he would ever find a will to return. What letters he received from Jesse McCree were written in a shaky hand, more and more sober with each

>   
>  _Missing you,  
>  Joel._  
> 

Genji had returned to a greying Jesse whose pain was written in his scars and wrinkles, but buried by the intensity of his roguish grins. Buried to all but Genji, who could see through his mask like it was made of water.

 _You look like hell,_ Genji had said.

“My specialty,” Jesse replied. His gloved fingers traveled the gentle curve of Genji’s spine, tracing metallic bumps and ridges up to the dip between his shoulderblades. Genji rested his head on Jesse’s shoulder, helmet clinking against hidden armor. He let out a sigh and wiggled closer, until there was not a fingers-width between them.

Jesse’s chest rose and fell with his breath, lifting Genji with each inhale and lowering with each exhale. It fast became a sleepy rhythm, neither uttering a word for fear of shattering the peace. 

Between the two of them, peace was not a sturdy platform. It was a mere minute until an airplane hummed through the night sky. Jesse laughed soft as silk.

“Seems you can’t escape life, even in the country,” he said, tucking his metal arm up under his head. “But you can catch a few winks. Better ‘n living in the big city, I say. Safer, in some ways.”

Genji lifted his hand to his face plate. With a hiss and a click, he pulled the plate away, dropped it with a muffled clatter to the rug below. 

He inhaled Jesse’s scent: some blend of wilderness, gunpowder, and metal. Genji rested his scarred cheek over Jesse’s heart. _Ba-dmp, ba-dmp, ba-dmp,_ it beat in tandem with the crickets.

“We should stay in a house in the country,” Genji murmured. He nuzzled Jesse’s chest.

Jesse shifted, the movement sliding Genji a half an inch closer to his shoulder. Genji bit back a surprised swear and dug his fingers into checkered cloth.

“We are, Genji. Right now. This very moment. Don’t tell me your cyborg ninja eyes missed that?” Teasing though he may have been, there was a note of concern behind Jesse’s words.

“Shuddup, Jess. I meant, like… _buy_ a house. You and I. In the country. We could have horses, and dogs and cats and rabbits, we could have a little stable and a field of wheat,” Genji said.

“Why the wheat?”

“To walk through. Do you remember _Gladiator?”_

“No,” Jesse said with a flick of his shaggy head. “There was wheat?”

“Yeah, he walked through the wheat at one point. I thought it was cool,” Genji continued. “It would be just you and I and the world. Can you imagine?”

Genji lifted his head; Jesse’s eyes were closed. A smile tilted the corner of his mouth.

“I am.” He said the words as if they bore a great weight, and to Genji, they did. For years he had run and run and run without stopping, looking back only to check that he ran the right road. All that running, and he had not looked ahead, either. He had stared at the ground, terrified of falling, terrified of what the future held.

He knew now that there had been no reason for him to be afraid.

“You and I, Jesse. We live on a little farm, have a couple of dogs. We have to travel sometimes, of course, but we live on a little farm away from the world. Maybe we even have a kid,” said Genji.

“A kid?” Jesse asked, head jerking to the side. Genji laughed into warm flannel.

“Maybe. I wouldn’t want to go too fast, you know. We both have things to work out, and with Overwatch…”

Jesse made a sound that was almost disappointed, too quickly for Genji to figure if he had heard right. He sighed, too, a kind of content sigh, like a kitten settling in the sunlight.

“What’d I name my kid,” Jesse hummed. “What would I name my kiddo… What would you name yours?”

Genji thought. “When I was little, I would have said Hanzo. For incredibly obvious reasons, that’s no longer the case.”

Jesse laughed, so hard that it rattled in Genji’s back. He gripped the cushion behind Jesse’s head like it was his lifeline - if death was ending up face-down on the floor, it was.

“Certainly doesn’t have anythin’ to do with him cutting off all your limbs, does it?” 

Genji grinned. “I might be a little biased.”

“Understandable,” Jesse managed. He paused to thoughtfully scratch his scruffy jawline. A buzz built in his throat, low and melodic, ending with a click of his teeth and a solemn smile.

“How about Gabriel?”

Genji blinked. “Gabriel? I…” A pause. “I like that, Jesse. Gabriel…”

A big hand combed through his hair, smoothing it back over Genji’s head. Every greying lock it passed through flopped back into place when it passed. Jesse’s hand finally settled at the base of Genji’s skull, and a moment later their lips met, soft, warm, tasting of home. Of family.

Genji pulled, Jesse lingered. When they finally separated, they found themselves too exhausted to speak any longer. Genji curled on Jesse’s broad chest, Jesse’s hands draped over his back. Genji drifted off, Jesse scant minutes after, and either of them dreamt of a little farmhouse with wheat and a dog, and a little boy called Gabriel.


End file.
